The Journal of the Invisible Woman
by Celinarose
Summary: The diary and evidence of one Dr. Rosalie Marvel, detailing her story. (Set in the present day.)
1. Chapter 1

December 25th, 2017

My name is Marvel.

I used to say these words with pride, expecting the person in front of me to recognise and congratulate me. And they did, at least for a while, in scientific circles, where people knew about my work. But outside? There was hardly anyone who knew of me. Even my own family never understood the magnitude of my achievements, and continues to think of me as the "one who didn't follow their mould."

The only one in our family who ever had any kind of claim to fame was my great-grandfather, Mr Thomas Marvel. He didn't do anything of his own, of course. All he did was tell stories at his inn. Granted, his stories were based on truth, but it was still no credit of his. He had just had the (good?) luck of meeting a very interesting man who changed my great-grandfather's life. In return, Mr Thomas Marvel made sure the man died. Of course, when he told the story, he painted it in completely different colours. One of the many people he recounted this tale to, turned out to be a famous author. Said author, in turn, embellished the story even further and published it as his own. Great-grandpa didn't mind, oh no. He loved it and made sure to tell our whole family that he was in a book.

The tales of his great deeds are still passed down, growing farther and farther from the truth with each generation that tells it. Nonetheless, I know that there is a grain of truth in them somewhere. Mainly in the old, musty books my grandfather keeps in his safe, refusing to let anyone touch his father's secret. I caught a glance of them once, so i know they are real. If they are what the book and my grandfather says they are is another matter altogether. But I'll find out. I'll have those books for myself and I will decipher what my great-grandfather couldn't. What's more, I will replicate and perhaps even improve upon what my predecessor did. I came home this Christmas with one purpose only, and that was to acquire the books.

This journal shall be the evidence of my success. They will all know me, then. I _will_ be, the invisible woman.

* * *

 _ **A/N: My first ever multi chapter! Well. Let's see how it goes. Reviews make my day! :)  
**_


	2. Chapter 2

March 17th, 2017

I have been told by...reliable sources, that I may have come across as arrogant in my previous entry. Apologies to anyone that reads this. uI am well aware that some people think I have a stick up my arse and they are not to be blamed, in all fairness. I am proud of the work I do. And sometimes, I get too excited, perhaps, about it.

Anyway, as far as the progress on my project is concerned, I am afraid it has been rather slow. I successfully acquired the journals, and that too, without arousing any suspicion from my family, who could never think of little old me being the one to take them away. But then, I spent, or rather wasted, nearly a month trying to discover the cipher used by Griffin, only to realise he used a combination of a simple substitution cipher and a Caesar Cipher. And each page, had a different key for both ciphers.

Then I ended up spending weeks trying to decode the pages, before Samantha, my fellow scientist, collaborator, and roommate intervened, reminding me I was ignoring the work that I was being paid to do, in favour of this.

I regret to say I snapped at her for saying so. But she was right, of course. She had been incredibly patient with my secrecy regarding the journals, but I realised that it would be much better for both of us if I told her everything.

She was a bit confused and sceptical, but she has agreed to help me decipher the code.

"Why have you not simply typed it out and used a software?" she asked me, when I told her. I replied that I dare not make a virtual copy of these journals. It is not as easy to delete data as it is to simply burn the journals and my translations, should anything be discovered.

She agreed. Like me, and unlike Dr Kemp out of Wells' story, she understands the importance of keeping our work safe.

Thankfully, my translations progressed much faster with her help. We have nearly decoded the entire set of books...and what secrets we found! Griffin wrote like a madman, thought like a madman, but his ideas are pure genius! And much more practically possible than I expected. I was basing my assumptions of Griffin's theory on the book, you see. But Wells was no scientist, and neither was my great grandfather, and between them they botched up his marvelous ideas to utter ridiculousness. Cats being invisible! Ha! Griffin did a much better job than _cats._

What a man! I wish I could have met him, sometimes. But I will do better than meet him. I will show the world what he did, and I will improve upon it! I won't be as foolish as he was, to make himself invisible before finding a way to reverse it! Sam has promised me her help. I will not stop till I succeed.

 _ **A/N: Chapter 2, finally! Hopefully updates will be a bit more frequent now...**_


	3. Chapter 3

May 17th, 2018

It has been a while since I have updated this journal, hasn't it? In my defence, not that I do need to defend myself, things have not gone well lately, and there has been little good news.

Firstly, the University has decided to cut down on our reasearch funding due to budget cuts. It annoys me so much that we have to suffer because some or the other administrator made a mistake! Then, our collaborators started getting impatient with us because we were not spending enough time working on our project with them. Of course, that's because of the _other,_ far more important task we have at hand, but obviously we couldn't tell them that. We had to make excuses and now I'm afraid we might lose the collaboration too.

Speaking of our other project, we hit a small snag on it. The formula doesn't work on melanin, only haemoglobin, as we expected, and I can't get the melanin to disappear. It's taking more time than I expected and with verything else that has been happening, Sam is ready to give up on it. I, of course, am not. So we came to a compromise and put it on hold for a while. We now spend the majority of our time working on what we are "supposed to". But every spare second I get, I try to work on the invisibility task. Sam says it is taking a toll on my health but she always does worry too much.

Anyway, there is another thing I am slightly worried about. Or rather, a person. Patricia James. That is, Sam's girlfriend Pat. She works in the neuroscience department of the University, and she has been with Sam for years, but lately she has been spending more and more time in my lab. Once or twice, I felt she was casually looking over my shoulder, even. She is one of those people with suspicious, shifty eyes... And I spoke to Sam about my observation, but she shrugged it off saying, "Maybe she comes here to spend more time with me!" I don't believe that is the reason, however. But well, it is what it is.

I realise this entry has been more of a ramble about my problems than an actual update about my work, but it is my journal, after all. I do hope that by the next time I write, there will be some developments, especially in the positive direction.

 ** _Notes: Sorry about the long wait, to any readers that do read this. Hopefully, as Rosalie said, there will be some development soon!_**


End file.
